


the scars make the man

by vickydd



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Ambiguous/Open Ending, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Bisexual Lance (Voltron), Canon Compliant, Character Study, Depression, Gen, Homesick Lance (Voltron), Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Insecure Lance (Voltron), Langst, Mental Anguish, Self-Harm, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms, a planet i made up named vitalez made up of pretty ladies, ambiguous but inferred as a happy ending, dont judge me my smol child is fucked up, hes too precious for this world, not so much hurt/comfort tbh, only a little tho, voltron took over my life so of course i wanted to cause Lance pain
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-13
Updated: 2017-06-13
Packaged: 2018-11-13 13:25:15
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,081
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11186031
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/vickydd/pseuds/vickydd
Summary: The first time Lance had ever picked up a razor and put it to his own skin with mal-intentions, he’d been thirteen.(or, Lance struggles with cutting as a coping mechanism, and he wonders if he'll ever be strong enough to go without it)A Lance character study





	the scars make the man

**Author's Note:**

> title from Scars by Michael Malarkey
> 
> WARNINGS IN END NOTES
> 
> this is my first time posting a story with such serious issues such as self-harm, depression, and unhealthy coping mechanisms and thoughts. my portrayal of Lance's emotions and actions are a reflection of the experiences i've had with the subject as well as what i have seen in the media and other creative works. 
> 
> if anything is overly offensive, etc, please let me know, but otherwise please enjoy the Langst
> 
> EDIT SEPT 6 2018: Wow.... guys, this is my first time receiving 500 kudos for a work. I went through the whole piece and edited it (because ngl there were a lot of errors). Thank you so much for your support and your views. I am really grateful that it seems like this fic has reached a lot of us in the Voltron fandom/ Langst fandom emotionally. I am also strangely a little sad, in a way, because if any one of you can relate to how Lance acts/feels in this fic (as one usually relates to / finds themselves in works they enjoy) that means that you have gone through more than I could ever imagine to understand. I wish all of you happiness and that you enjoy reading this, as I enjoyed writing it, and that you can take something from it. Even if it's just me being silly and wanting to offer all of you internet hugs and cookies. All of us deserve to be happy, just like Lance. <3

 

> _"This world is full of precious souls wearing masks to hide the pain."_

* * *

 

 

The first time Lance had ever picked up a razor and put it to his own skin with mal-intentions, he’d been thirteen.

His grades were dropping. His father and mother were fighting every day. His younger sister had broken her leg because he hadn’t been watching her carefully enough and she climbed up a tree and fell.

If his marks kept dropping, he wouldn’t get into the Garrison.

If his parents kept fighting, he would have to keep comforting his siblings each night as they came to him in tears.

If his mask came off, he didn’t think his family would survive it.

Lance knew this. Lance kept it on.

Lance also blamed himself.

It was hard to keep the mask on, and even with it on, he still managed to keep messing up.

Still managed to be the reason his parents were fighting. The reason his sister got hurt.

So, he picked up the razor. He dug it into the skin of his hip.

He did it again.

He put a new mask on. A stronger one.

He kept going.

He kept cutting.

He got into the Garrison.

His parents started cooling down around each other, being loving again.

His siblings found their support in their parents again, and Lance watched, smiling.

His older brother asked him if he was okay, and he said he was.

He was stronger now – of course he was okay.

* * *

 

At the Garrison, Lance had found that the uniforms made it easier.

He could cut into his biceps. His forearm. His thighs.

Never the wrists. Never the chest. But there were more places.

He laughed with Hunk, and then excused himself to the bathroom.

He stumbled into Takashi Shirogane one day, spilling his hero’s drink all over his uniform, and apologized profusely. His thighs had stung when they ran ten miles in training the next day.

He studied hard and long for an exam he would only finish second in, and then cut long and hard until he couldn’t feel the pain of his failure or the cuts.

He joked about his rivalry with Keith Kogane, but the moment he left and Iverson moved him up in the ranks because of it, Lance only stopped cutting because he’d began to feel extremely light-headed.

He still ate. Still talked amiably. Still joked. Still made sure he looked good. Still made friends. Hunk. Pidge.

Still wanted adventure. A good life. Love.

But he held the razor close. Held his mask closer. Without them, he didn’t know who he was.

Without them, he didn’t think he could keep going.

Without them, he wasn’t strong.

* * *

 

Finding Blue seemed like a mistake.

Lance kept waiting for the other shoe to drop, but Ashton Kutcher never showed up, and he didn’t wake up from a dream, and no one told him to snap out of it. He stopped waiting.

Blue was lovely. Lance loved her.

But he missed his family. He missed Earth. He missed feeling like he belonged. He wasn’t sure if he’d ever actually felt that last one, but God if he doesn’t wish he had.

After finding Blue, he stops cutting. He puts the others first. The universe. The aliens whose planets were overrun.

They needed him more than he did, so he was going to help. He could still be strong.

Just like Blue, it was sort of lovely. His mask was still on, but there were no aches. No stings. No reminders that he’s weaker than the people around him.

Until Keith has to go and open his mouth.

Lance barely brushes off words like useless pathetic stupid slow not good enough before he’s off to his room, searching the desks for something he hadn’t touched since he took it out of his jacket the first day.

The razor.

He cuts, and he cuts, and he tries to make up for the month where he had felt alright. Needed. Worthy. Strong.

He knows he was wrong now. The universe needing him – not even that can make him strong.

The next day at training, it’s exhilarating when no one notices how sore he is. How tired. How hurt.

Shiro makes Keith apologize. Lance sneers but accepts the apology, making a joke of it.

This. This he can keep up.

Keep cutting. Keep putting on an act.

He’ll only be stronger. Start doing something useful for once.

Ha. Keith is an idiot.

* * *

 

Lance is amazed, kind of like he’d been when they found Blue, when they get back to the castle one day after a battle and the rest of the team rush to him.

That was amazing, they say. Spectacular, they say. Wow, Lance, I didn’t know you had it in you, they say.

Lance doesn’t cut that night, and he tells himself it because he’s too tired.

He wakes in the morning refreshed, and it isn’t until the next day at training, no stinging in his movements, that he realizes he hadn’t felt the need.

The thought distracts him, and the team fails the level of training they were on.

Lance makes sure to make up for it with his razor that night.

* * *

 

He had been fooling himself. Of course he had.

Seven people, one ship. Seventh wheel or not, people noticed things.

People being Coran.

The red-headed self-proclaimed hero notices as Lance helps him clean an old storage room in the castle.

Lance removed his jacket, and his baseball tee had been sweating cats and dogs. Coran calls him over, and insists that the best way to reach the highest box on the shelf was to have Lance use Coran’s hands as a stepping stool.

Unbeknownst to him, Lance’s shirt rides up as he reaches for the box, and Coran catches a glimpse of white lines lining Lance’s waistband where his pants are riding a little low.

They look like scars. Neat little lines that crisscross on his lower back.

Lance gets what they need from the box, and Coran allows him down, intrigued.

Those are interesting scars on your back, Lance, he says. Do all humans have them?

Lance almost chokes. Um, he says. Not really. Sort of.

Oh, Coran says, confused.

Lance trips on a pile of collected knick-knacks on the floor and smooths down his shirt, anxious. Come on, come on. Lie. Say something. It’s not that hard.

Certain humans have those, he mumbles. Coran asks why, and he shrugs. I guess they mean something, but I’m not sure, he lies.

Lance gets away from there as quickly as he can, and smacks his head into the door of his room after it slides shut.

Stupid.

So stupid.

Using his hand, he drags his nails across his lower back until it bleeds, and lies down. He’s not going to dinner tonight.

* * *

 

It doesn’t come up again (bless Coran’s gullible soul) until they land on a planet with humanoid aliens looking for help against the Galra troops that have made base some ways away from the planet’s capital.

The planet is Vitalez, and it’s people the Vize, an all-female group, who are of pale pink skin, an assortment of lush hair colors, and gorgeously colored eyes. Lance notices even Shiro shocked by some of them before he clears his throat in an awkward but diligent greeting.

One of the Vize, a pretty thing with violet eyes, flushed skin and lavish teal hair, is all over Lance. Lance had dropped a line, and the girl – Millie – was hooked. This had never happened to him before, and he figures it is a result of the all-female population.

He flirts with her, pleased every time she smiles cutely and shows off her strangely colored dimples. She’s beautiful, so when they save her planet and there is a celebration afterwards, which Voltron politely accepts the invitation to, he is completely okay with her sneaking him away from the party.

He ignores Pidge’s disgusted look and Shiro’s worried but mostly disapproving stare, and follows Millie dutifully to a deserted bedroom chamber.

She plants a kiss on his cheek, and it isn’t long before he has his lips on her full ones and her eyes and hair is all he sees. It’s passionate, it’s nice, and Lance can say he’s legitimately enjoying himself. He is nineteen after all, and it’s nice to feel rewarded for your hard work once in a while.

He lets her take his jacket off, and she lets him throw her dress to the ground. Give and go, they land on the bed breathless and shirtless, the lights dim from the pale blue moonlight in the windows. He’d done this before, with a girl back home who he had crushed on for years and they’d finally gotten their hears out of their asses the summer before his Junior year. There had been other girls, a couple of guys too if Lance was being frank, since then, but all were flings.

Millie is running her hands up his chest, lips sweet on his. She pulls on his biceps, squeezing in a way that makes something heat in Lance’s groin.

But she stops. Lance blinks his eyes open, and lets his hands roam away from Millie’s nice ass and onto her hips.

He asks her What’s up? Did I do something wrong?

She perks an eyebrow at him and giggles at his concern, but shakes her head, a frown settling her dazzling features. Millie is almost as pretty as Allura, and Lance swipes softly at a piece of teal hair that has fallen onto her face.

You have scars, she says. Lots of scars.

And God, its like Lance’s heart stops.

Millie had been warm in his arms, but now she’s cold. He closes his eyes and breathes. He doesn’t want to stop. Doesn’t want to explain himself. Does it bother you? he asks.

No, she says. But someone as kind as you, Lance, she tells him, they don’t deserve to have this many scars.

Something flutters in his chest, and he takes a breath. Feeling returns. So much feeling.

Each of his scars ache in a way they never have before. He feels them. He feels worthy to feel them. Worthy to not want them anymore. Strong in a different way.

Speechless, and not wanting to talk, Lance kisses Millie again, and that’s that.

* * *

 

Lance is able to stop cutting again after that.

Scars start closing up, finding refuge in new skin cells. He extends his facials to some of the more battered parts of his body, and one day – one day he puts his razor at the bottom of his new closet and forgets about it.

Coran never asks him about his scarring. The others never notice.

Lance is okay.

* * *

 

He thought he was.

He’d been so so confident.

But still, he doesn’t understand why it’s this that makes his world crumble around him.

Coran was being nice. They were all being nice.

They’d landed on a planet made of blues browns and greens. It looked so much like Earth. Lance had dug his nails into the palms of his hands to make sure he wasn’t dreaming.

And then, just after they landed – the rain began.

Lance ran outside, he spread his arms, he laughed, he cried.

The others were with him, Hunk tearing up and Shiro laughing and Pidge smiling and Keith looking glum but satisfied. They were with him.

Until suddenly, all Lance could see was how Hunk walked over to Pidge to talk about how they could collect this water for tests and hydroelectric inventions and yada yada. All he could see was Shiro approaching Keith and grabbing his arms, telling him to loosen up. All he could see was Coran turning away from him and finding the Princess – telling her about the beauty of it all.

All he could see was that whether he made a great joke at this very moment or not, none of the others would care. None of them would see him.

Surrounded by the warmth of familiar rain and his only friends in the galaxy, Lance never felt more alone.

Any making light of the seventh wheel topic he had managed since his conversation with the Yupper  became meaningless in Lance’s head. He feels more tears stream down his cheek, but he knows these have nothing to do with the comfort the rain had brought his homesickness.

His heart drops into the pit of his stomach and Lance coughs loudly, telling the others he’s going to head inside.

Their faces drop, but he doesn’t even finish telling them he feels a cold coming on before they’re re-immersed into their previous conversations.

The steps back to his room are heavy, and his arms are jelly as he digs through his closet. His hand closes around what he’s looking for, and he lets the pain anchor him. Lets it make him as unworthy as the others must see him. Lets it guide him into overwhelming adrenaline, lightheaded when he finally stops.

But he does stop, because the universe still needs him, and for them, he has to make that enough.

He doesn’t feel strong anymore, though. Only numb, and hurt.

* * *

 

Once again, he had to be fooling himself if he figured that with only seven people inhabiting a ship, he could get away with it.

Even at home, there had been over ten people present at any which time. And everyone had been a lot more concentrated on themselves. Lance didn’t have that luxury here.

Blue is mad at him.

She would still listen to him during battles, and still provoke a warmth in his chest Lance could only compare with a mother’s hug, but she wasn’t buying his act any longer.

So he stopped acting when he was with her.

A sentient lion is the first thing that Lance removes his mask for, six years later.

The first time she’d been mad at him like this, he’d stayed with her after battle and cried, telling her he would do better.

He was trying, and she understood that, but he could tell it wasn’t enough. She was still mad.

So Lance got mad in return. Because no. He will not be reprimanded by his sentient lion for coping in a way that works for him. She chose him. She can deal with it. Everyone else does.

He wants to hurt her. Wants her to stop nagging him to stop his self-harm, and wants her, if he’s lying to himself, to stop caring. No one else does, she shouldn’t be burdened by it. He wants to hurt her, so that maybe then, maybe then she would stop. Everything would stop.

He brings his razor into his lion.

It’s the middle of the night, and he didn’t bother putting on his armor. He had tossed and turned all night, because he couldn’t get Blue’s nagging out of his head.

“You want to see pain?” he yells in the cockpit, voice rough and heated. He sits in his pilot’s seat and rips his shirt off his hear. He’s already crying.

He grabs the razor from his jacket and ignores the warm hug, the soothing hum, the kind nudge.

He ignores Blue, and he cuts.

Blood drips onto the floor of the cockpit, and Lance makes a mental note to clean it up.

He switches hands, and takes a stab at the other arm.

He lets his anger rush out to meet Blue’s warmth, but all he meets is forgiveness and despair.

He stops, the warmth of his blood seeping out of him. Why is she feeling those things? Why is she forgiving him? No! Lance doesn’t want forgiveness, he wants anger.

But there is no anger.

“What!?” he yells. “What now?”

The lights of the dark hangar room turn on, and Lance scrambles to put his shirt on.

He gets red on the white and curses himself for not bringing his jacket. His blue ¾ sleeves are staining brown, and he’s desperate. He feels Blue’s mouth open beneath him.

No, no, no, don’t do this, you stupid lion. Stop caring!

Lance can feel her hurt, and can’t bring himself to be actually angry. She’s doing what any sane person should do. She’s trying to help.

Lance doesn’t want help. He knows his place, and as he’s learned over the past couple of years, he knows his own value.

It takes him by surprise when he hears Shiro.

“Lance? Are you in there?”

Lance doesn’t say anything. He’s frozen.

Frozen between a rock and a hard place.

Let Shiro find him like this, frozen, or put on an act and Shiro finds him anyway.

The first is less painful.

Shiro’s white fluff is visible, and then Lance is swallowing hard. “Don’t,” he says, but it’s not loud enough for Shiro to hear him.

Lance is tired of feel Ing stuck inside himself, invisible and quiet. He’s never yearned more to be able to be loud. To make himself visible. To rip the mask off in one fell swoop. To be stronger.

But it doesn’t work like that.

Shiro stands to his full height in Blue’s cockpit, staring.

His mouth is agape, and his chest moves in a fearful gasp. “Lance…

"Lance… your arms.”

Lance sobs, and moves forward.

Shiro must think Lance is coming in for a hug, because he doesn’t move. Lance pushes him back rather aggressively instead.

“No! No! Shut up!”

He is surrounded by blue's betrayal, encased by Shiro's pity, and held prisoner by his own crumbling mask.

“Lance!”

“No!”

Lance beats into Shiro’s chest, vision blurred with tears and chest constricting from sobs. He gets his blood all over the Black Paladin's sleep clothes, and he wants to keep going, to keep beating himself against Shiro - Shiro who is strong and brave and all the things lance isnt, Shiro who can take it - until Shiro has all his blood and there’s no longer any use for Lance.

“Lance! Stop! Lance, you can’t! You’ll make it worse! Lance!”

Shiro knocks him out, and Lance lets the darkness take over.

* * *

 

Lance dreams that the first time he had brought a razor to his skin with mal-intentions, his mother had opened the door of the empty bathroom and cried into his arms.

I love you, mijo. I don’t want to see you hurt, mijo. Do not do that to yourself, mijo. I love you, mijo.

He wakes up with tears in his eyes.

* * *

 

The sheets aren’t his. The bed isn’t his. He doesn’t recognize where he is.

“You’re in my room,” he hears, and then he sees Shiro.

The twenty-five-year old looks tired. There’s dry blood on his cheek, and some on his hands too. He’s wearing his usual get up, having changed, but not his usual confidence.

Lance remembers what happens, and he sits up rashly.

Shiro stops him before he can stand up.

“No. No, Lance, sit down. We – we need to have a conversation.”

So Lance sits. He listens to Shiro tell him that what he’s doing isn’t okay. He listens to him say that the others and himself, they had no idea, but that they don't want to see him hurt.

Lance tells him that they don’t see him at all, and Shiro swallows roughly.

“That’s not true,” he tells him.

Ha, Lance thinks.

Lance listens to Shiro tell him that he wants to help, because this behaviour can’t go on. “It’s not good for you, it’s not good for the team, and it’s definitely not good for the universe,” he says.  

“Well, I’ve been handling it fine so far,” Lance spits.

Shiro’s eyes widen. “How long?” he asks.

“Six years.”

Shiro's chin falls to his chest, his nostrils flaring as his eyes close. Takes a breath. Then another. “Lance. . . that’s – that’s not okay.”

“Seemed okay just yesterday,” he says, relentless. He _will_ get Shiro to let this go. He _will._

“It’s not. None of this is,” the man mutters, shaking his head.

Lance is cruel. His blue eyes harden. “What’s it to you, Shiro?”

“I’m your leader! I – I cant believe I didn’t see it – I’m sorry I didn’t see it. . . I’m sorry,” Shiro whispers, dark eyes glistening. He looks tormented in the same way he does when he has a flashback to his forgotten time with the Galra. Lance tells himself he does not care. He screenshots the memory as a reminder of how horrible he is before saying what he does next.

“As I said, Shiro, none of you see it. That’s okay. I’m the seventh wheel. I’m okay. You can stop pretending to care.”

He knows its rude, knows it shitty, won't ever let himself forget that Shiro has had it tougher than all of them, almost. But he says it anyway. He means it anyway.

Shiro is hurt for a second, and Lance fears for another blow to the head. But the glistening eyes are replaced with familiar rage.

The kind of rage directed at oneself. 

“No!” is Shiro's reply. “No, you are not okay, and _I_ will not let this go on. I’m sorry it has for so long. I’m sorry.”

Its like it’s the only thing the man can say. _I’m sorry._

“Why are you apologizing?” Lance continues, ice in his veins. “I’m the one who should be sorry. I let you find me like that. You’ve known me the least time out of everyone. It’s not your responsibility anyway. _I_ am not your responsibility. So drop it. I’m okay.”

_“Stop lying!”_

Shiro’s words echo in his head, they pound through his body, and circulate through his veins. They fire soemthing up in his system that had felt ice cold only a second before.

The man had snapped. Wow, Lance must have really fucked up.

Shame flushes onto Lance's cheeks. It's not unpleasant, instead the sort of warmth one feels when a parent reprimands them, or a friend calls them dumb for not tying their shoe then tripping. It brings tears to Lance's eyes again, his heart swelling under his rib cage.

“What do you want me to do, then?” he asks, voice unsteady, and afraid of the answer. Afraid of a lot of things.

Shiro pauses for a moment, studying him. Deciding whether he’s actually broken through to Lance or not.

He takes another deep breath. And another. “Tell me why.”

Lance chokes on his breath, and inhales deeply. He shares only because of the tingling way he can still feel his flush on his cheeks, the proof that Shiro does think he is important, does care, plain and clear in the way a tear falls from his cheek.

His eyes must be waterfalls, because more tears follow and flow down his cheeks. He chokes a bit as he says it, but when he does, Shiro’s face changes.

“Because it takes the pain away.”

“What pain?”

Lance isn’t looking at him anymore. A wave crashes somewhere in the back of his mind, a cool breeze splashing sea salt and water. His face feels as cold as if the breeze had really washed through him.

He takes his right hand and puts it up to his left chest. “This pain.”

* * *

 

Shiro wants to ask more, but he doesn’t know how. Doesn’t know what to do in this position.

There is no higher help he can call, not really. He can't warn Lance’s parents. He can’t tell a teacher, or an adult. He can’t recommend help.

He is the adult. He is the help.

So Shiro reassures Lance that he’s extremely valuable to the group, helps him patch up the two long red lines on his forearms, and asks him to stop.

Asks for the razor, and doesn’t stop arguing with Lance until he gets it.

Asks him if there are more, and believes Lance when he says there aren’t.

He also notices things. It’s like his visit into Blue had given him new eyes, because suddenly Lance’s mask is obvious. His old scars are bright pale lines amongst the tan skin. The team’s negligence of Lance is like a neon colored sign in the dark.

He couldn’t let this go on. He had to talk to the others.

Lance leaves his room, and if it weren’t for the dried blood left on his body and clothes, Shiro could have believed he was never there.

* * *

 

 

 

> _"The scar means that you were stronger than what had tried to hurt you."_

**Author's Note:**

> WARNINGS: Lance cuts regularly as a coping mechanism for intense insecurity and self hatred that he does not understand and continues to lie to himself about. Also, he snaps at others (Shiro, his lion) as a way to make himself feel less worthy of their care and attention. 
> 
> i would love love love some feedback! is it any good? are the creative liberties i took (having some dialogue without "") okay? did the read make you feel? did you like it?  
> you can find me on tumblr as lumenalumia
> 
> kudos and comments are life
> 
> have a good night! <3
> 
> EDIT SEPT 6 2018: Wow.... guys, this is my first time receiving 500 kudos for a work. I went through the whole piece and edited it (because ngl there were a lot of errors). Thank you so much for your support and your views. I am really grateful that it seems like this fic has reached a lot of us in the Voltron fandom/ Langst fandom emotionally. I am also strangely a little sad, in a way, because if any one of you can relate to how Lance acts/feels in this fic (as one usually relates to / finds themselves in works they enjoy) that means that you have gone through more than I could ever imagine to understand. I wish all of you happiness and that you enjoy reading this, as I enjoyed writing it, and that you can take something from it. Even if it's just me being silly and wanting to offer all of you internet hugs and cookies. All of us deserve to be happy, just like Lance. <3
> 
> SHOULD I MAKE A SEQUEL? - COMMENT AND LET ME KNOW


End file.
